They took us to the airport and left us there for three days. We couldn’t travel, because we didn’t have tickets. Armed gunmen, who we were told were from the armed forces, threatened us. We feared we would be shot if we continued to protest. We were then rounded up in a camp.
• Factory worker in Mauritius

This paper has been written as an input for the seminar “Campaigning strategies on informal labour in the global garment industry,” organized by the Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC), the International Restructuring Education Network Europe (IRENE), and the Evangelische Akademie Meissen in 2004.

This publication examines areas of women’s work in the world economy which have been largely ignored by labour market statistics, media headlines and research projects. It provides
basic information on the informal economy and export processing zones, in which the vulnerable work of women predominate, and looks at the development of women’s work in the context of globalisation and the prevailing gender order.
Written by Sudwind and Evangelical-Lutheran Church in Bavaria, 2010.